Saturday May 14th 2016

The weather was close to perfect today. The temperature got up to about 75 and the wind was not an issue for most of the day. Toward evening the clouds came in fast and the wind picked up significantly.

I took advantage of the good weather to get in a longer bicycle ride. I road to the east end of the canal. While it is officially called the end, most people think of the canal entrance at Cape Cod bay as the northern end of the canal. The canal really goes from west south west to east north east on the compass.

Slow moving cruiser in the canal. It was fighting the current hard.

My ride covered about 12 miles total. A couple of miles short of the 14 mile round trip on the inland side of the canal do to my starting point near the Bourne bridge. I made good time on the first part of the outbound trip. A slow moving cruiser in the canal only caught up with me when I stopped at the Herring Run in Bournedale to see the fish climbing the fish ladder. The run is just getting started so the number of fish while significant, was not huge.

Fuel barge passing the power plant in the canal.

From the Herring Run to the end of the canal my ride was slowed by congestion. Dog walkers that allow there properly leashed pups to wander from side to side seeking the best grass for smelling are a menace, but not as bad as little kids on bicycles. One woman on a bicycle passed by me at a reasonable pace as I was riding slowly watching the water. She had to slam on her brakes about a hundred feet in front of me to avoid running into a 5 or 6 year old and his sibling that decided they needed to ride in circles around their walking parents. The parents weren’t paying any attention to the kids or the traffic around them. Luckily everyone was OK, but it wasn’t a really safe place today.

Travel got even harder on the final leg of the service road from the Sagamore bridge to the end of the canal. A charity walk for Cystic Fibrosis was being held. Hoards of people wearing blue tee shirts were walking in groups of 2 to 40 or so. Many of them had no idea that they needed to share the road with other people and bicycle riders. Winding my way around and through these groups was a slow process. I’m sure that many of them had no idea why a yellow line down the middle along with directional arrows are painted on the road.

Several of the charity walkers brought new puppies along on the walk. Cute little things but their ability to walk on a leash in a crowd hasn’t developed yet. I saw more than one person get turned around by the leash around and between their legs. I can appreciate the desire to participate in the charity walk, but why inflict being charitable on the dogs.

Sailboat and open cockpit boat entering East end of Canal

Sailboat with sail deployed

Sailboat showing the colors.

Yet another sailboat.

The volume of boats in the canal increased significantly do to the fair weather weekend day. I saw several sailboats, a couple of commercial fishing boats, and many fast moving open cockpit boats that need to find a boat ramp by the end of the day. As for bigger commercial traffic, I only saw one fuel barge being pushed by a tugboat.

Commercial fishing boat

Commercial fishing trawler

On my evening walk, I encountered another charity using the canal service road. This time it was a running event to raise money for Lyme disease research and treatment. The race had already finished at the dinning tent in the campground. The runners and their supporters were enjoying a cookout.

Tomorrow is forecast to be cooler. I’ll use the day to go inland and work at the house.